If I were God...
If I had the choice, if I had the power, if I could change time forever, banish pain, would I? I would want to. That is for sure, but I hesitate to say it would be...good to do so. Not because of some nonsensical sense that good ceases to exist without evil, but because I do not know what that would do to our ability to feel. Would we be able to? I stated in an earlier page that without the choice to disobey (do evil) or obey (do good), there would be no free will and no ability to truly love. But what about pain? Why does it have to be so....painful.
What we see as virtues: honesty, faithfulness, self-sacrifice, care, etc. all the noble notions we have of what makes a man good and what makes us humans...I am hard pressed to think of one that does not express itself in the presence of difficulty. We can be faithful in the presence of apathy, honest in the face of persecution, sacrificial in the face of adversity, and caring in the presence of turmoil. The list goes on but the principle stands. Can you feel without the chance of getting hurt? Vulnerability. It is something we tend to dread but something we must do if we want to be loved. Vulnerability in the face of possible rejection. That can rip a heart in two, but without it...where would we be?
Think of physical pain. Without pain receptors we would stand in a fire without getting burned, continue running with a broken leg, and we would die by mere scratches without even knowing we had them. Emotional pain is similarly important. Without emotional pain, we would not cry at funerals, we would not relate with other people, we would be apathetic toward our family, our children, we would not care - even about our own life. Vulnerability - the chance of rejection or acceptance. Without the possibility of emotional pain... love, mercy, joy, laughter, friendship, intimacy, hospitality, etc. these would be impossible as well.
Without emotional pain we would not feel pain when a good friend moves away, we would not feel pain when someone we love dies. Would it be possible to change that? Would it be right to change that? What could you do to change that? Make them live forever? God has already given us eternal life with Him... Take away their pain yourself? God has already promised us this at the end of all things. Force them to get along and stay close? Does that not take away their own free will? And without free will can there be love? Take away the more severe pains and leave other more profitable pains? Where do you draw the line?
Who we are is defined by “nature” and “nurture”. People argue over the percentages but I believe they are relatively equal in influence. Nature is the influence of genetics and scientific factors upon what makes you who you are. This is personality tendencies, physical looks and to a certain extent your preferences. We have yet to crack just how much is defined by your genetic make-up - how much the chemical reactions within you defines what you do and how much you define what chemical reactions happen within you. But just as equally important is the Nurture side of influence. Nurture is the influence of events and people within your life. It is the influence of what happens to you in life. I can draw a direct correlation from my tendency toward introversion to what happened in my childhood. This influence is more fluid and complicated than pure genetics. The same thing could happen to two different people and turn out two completely different reactions.
The reason I go into this is because if you mess with people’s reactions and the inherent chance of pain, if you cut out some pains or mess with people’s feelings, not only do you limit the ability to love, but you change the impact pain has on people’s lives. It is cutting out the influence of Nurture upon someone’s life. Without Nurture what are we but genetically engineered robots?
Everything turns upon the choice. The choice to do good or evil, the choice of vulnerability. The choice. If I could would I choose to let evil and pain exist? Let me answer it this way...
Although it would be great to live in a world with no hate, pain, or evil, I would not trade it out for the world if it meant loosing the love, joy, and beauty of this world.
If I were God... I would not change a thing.
Jared Williams
What we see as virtues: honesty, faithfulness, self-sacrifice, care, etc. all the noble notions we have of what makes a man good and what makes us humans...I am hard pressed to think of one that does not express itself in the presence of difficulty. We can be faithful in the presence of apathy, honest in the face of persecution, sacrificial in the face of adversity, and caring in the presence of turmoil. The list goes on but the principle stands. Can you feel without the chance of getting hurt? Vulnerability. It is something we tend to dread but something we must do if we want to be loved. Vulnerability in the face of possible rejection. That can rip a heart in two, but without it...where would we be?
Think of physical pain. Without pain receptors we would stand in a fire without getting burned, continue running with a broken leg, and we would die by mere scratches without even knowing we had them. Emotional pain is similarly important. Without emotional pain, we would not cry at funerals, we would not relate with other people, we would be apathetic toward our family, our children, we would not care - even about our own life. Vulnerability - the chance of rejection or acceptance. Without the possibility of emotional pain... love, mercy, joy, laughter, friendship, intimacy, hospitality, etc. these would be impossible as well.
Without emotional pain we would not feel pain when a good friend moves away, we would not feel pain when someone we love dies. Would it be possible to change that? Would it be right to change that? What could you do to change that? Make them live forever? God has already given us eternal life with Him... Take away their pain yourself? God has already promised us this at the end of all things. Force them to get along and stay close? Does that not take away their own free will? And without free will can there be love? Take away the more severe pains and leave other more profitable pains? Where do you draw the line?
Who we are is defined by “nature” and “nurture”. People argue over the percentages but I believe they are relatively equal in influence. Nature is the influence of genetics and scientific factors upon what makes you who you are. This is personality tendencies, physical looks and to a certain extent your preferences. We have yet to crack just how much is defined by your genetic make-up - how much the chemical reactions within you defines what you do and how much you define what chemical reactions happen within you. But just as equally important is the Nurture side of influence. Nurture is the influence of events and people within your life. It is the influence of what happens to you in life. I can draw a direct correlation from my tendency toward introversion to what happened in my childhood. This influence is more fluid and complicated than pure genetics. The same thing could happen to two different people and turn out two completely different reactions.
The reason I go into this is because if you mess with people’s reactions and the inherent chance of pain, if you cut out some pains or mess with people’s feelings, not only do you limit the ability to love, but you change the impact pain has on people’s lives. It is cutting out the influence of Nurture upon someone’s life. Without Nurture what are we but genetically engineered robots?
Everything turns upon the choice. The choice to do good or evil, the choice of vulnerability. The choice. If I could would I choose to let evil and pain exist? Let me answer it this way...
Although it would be great to live in a world with no hate, pain, or evil, I would not trade it out for the world if it meant loosing the love, joy, and beauty of this world.
If I were God... I would not change a thing.
Jared Williams
